BroShack, A Gathering of Idiots
by twopunch
Summary: Written for the Canadian Shack 10th Anniversary Party 2012. Three crack-headed short stories, pre-Heresy starring Curze, Dorn, Sigismund, Sheng and the Mournival in a Canadian Shack.  No, it's not supposed to make sense.
1. Chapter 1

Brothers In Cold- WH40K (Horus Heresy)

_Written for the Canadian Shack 10th Anniversary Party 2012._

Summary: Genetically engineered test-tube godlings finally learn to get along.

* * *

><p>The space hulk was jokingly called <em>The Canadian Shack<em> by the explorator team. The fused ships had merged in such a way that from a distance, the Terran lieutenant who had provided the nomenclature said, its surface resembled northern log cabins shown in the history books of Merica. Dorn didn't find the moniker as hilarious as Magos Suda, who was in charge of the Mechanicum explorator ship and evidently an expert in early Terran history.

Given the nature of their creation, space hulks were irregular things; no two looked the same. Yet _The Canadian Shack_ boasted such a horizontal regularity that one could almost imagine it had been crafted with a deliberate hand. Impossible, of course. Still, the magos explorator could barely contain her excitement at the chance to study this unusual find.

It so happened that the _Shack_ translated into real-space near the Cheraut system, where the expedition fleet comprised of the III, VII and VIII Legiones Astartes was headed. Upon intercepting the message that a space hulk had been found, a small contingent of the main fleet detoured to support the explorator team in their mission. The rest continued on their original course.

Rogal Dorn, defacto commander of the expedition fleet, though his brothers Fulgrim and Konrad Curze were also present, had been rather stressed during transit time. He wasn't close to many of brothers and he hoped these joint expeditions would foster a better relationship between them, as well as between their legions.

It hadn't worked.

He had no quarrel with Fulgrim; they just had little in common aside from a strong sense of responsibility to the Emperor and his budding Imperium, and a nature that fostered self-improvement and self-discipline. Dorn never knew what to say to Fulgrim about the arts, and Fulgrim didn't subscribe to the stoic ideals Dorn favoured.

With Curze...

As Dorn cut down another greenskin with his chainsword, he sighed with frustration. Sigismund's suggestion that he might improve his mood by slaughtering xenos scum for the explorator team had not worked as well as he'd hoped. The few greenskins found infesting the space hulk were finished off too easily to be more than a minor distraction. When Dorn caught sight of his morose brother swiping at a large greenskin with his crackling lightning claws, his own dark thoughts came flooding back to him. Blood splattered the plain, white, octogonal corridors of the ancient Terran starship that made up this part of the _Shack_as they sliced through the greenskins, still-pulsing pieces falling to the ground with heavy, wet smacks.

Curze caught Dorn's stare, the red lenses of his winged battle-helm glinting in the embedded lights of the ship.

"Brother?" came the soft, throaty growl of Curze's vox-distorted voice.

Dorn looked away, checking in on the vox-net how their boarding party was faring. Space hulks were notoriously hard to scan given interference from both their unique structure and warp taint, but it seemed initial assessments were correct that the _Shack_only carried a small force of greenskins. Nonetheless, He and Curze had found themselves separated from the rest of the boarding party. A trifling matter, for two such beings as them.

**"**Let's push on," Dorn said, "we should get back to the Cheraut system." **  
><strong>**  
><strong>Of course, that was when it happened.

They had stepped into another ship, from the long corridor of the last one into a dank, gunmetal gray room that seemed to have been crew quarters at some point in its life. Rows of empty bunks like metal skeletons stretched into the gloom. Dust and scraps were all that remained of the mattresses they had held. There was a loud creak and the groan of stressed steel.

Suddenly, the connection to the room was sealed off, preventing the primarchs from backtracking to rejoin their forces. The temperature dropped sharply, a rim of frost crackling around the edges of the room, and Dorn and Curze immediately regrouped, weapons up. Witchcraft, or a holdover of the warp still running through the space hulk?

The lights flickered, then cut out.

Their armour powered down. The regulators in their suits whined, cycling off, and soon the cold seeped in.

Metal on metal, they left dents on the walls as they rammed forcefully into them with their armor. Bolter rounds exploded uselessly, leaving black discoloration in their wake. Both Dorn's chainsword and Curze's gauntlets had lost power as well, though it didn't stop them from using the weapons as blunt with the strength of their arms and their weapons, they barely scratched the surface of their unexpected their suits inoperable, they couldn't vox their forces. All that remained for them to do was to wait until the others eventually found them.

Dorn unlocked his helmet, moisture-laden air hissing out and freezing around the gorget of his suit. With the visor useless and the air filters barely functioning, it made little sense to keep it on. He breathed in the chilled air and squinted. He could see nothing in the darkness. And it was getting colder.

"Can you see anything?" Dorn asked Curze.

There was a click and a hiss of depressurized air as Curze removed his helmet as well. After a pause, "There are no exits," said Curze. Dorn trusted his brother's superior night vision. From what little Curze had shared with them, it seemed his life on Nostramo had served him well in at least this aspect.

Dorn could hear a faint rattling sound and the chatter of teeth. Curze was shivering. The environmental protection provided by their armour was gone, and the metal was now as cold as the atmosphere around them. Though their bodies still emitted heat, the insides of their artificer armour were becoming lined with ice. Dorn hardly noticed, having grown up on the Ice Hives of Inwit, but it seemed Curze was used to warmer climes.

"We could share my cloak," Dorn offered. "It will keep us warm until our men find us." He heard a susurration, and assumed it was Curze's hair shifting as he nodded. Curze was tense as Dorn helped him out of his armour. Dorn was unhappy with the turn of events himself, but it was a necessity, loathe as they both were to admit it. The cold was deepening, enough that even Dorn was starting to feel it, his fingers going numb as he worked to undo intricate clasps and locks.

With a final clang, he dropped the last part of his own armour into the pile he'd made, distantly registering the way its iced surface burned his hands. He turned, and frozen fingers grasped the back of his knee. Startled, he almost kicked out in reaction to the unexpected touch before realising it was just Curze trying to guide him in the dark, blind as he was without the light.

Curze was already curled into Dorn's cloak, this one made from the pelt of a Baal beast, a gift from their brother Sanguinius. It was thick and soft, dark red with a brindle pattern, and large enough to cover the two primarchs, if they sat close.

Neither of them was prepared to do that. Dorn had ever been aloof, implacable as the snow-capped mountains of his youth and it was rare that anyone touched his naked skin nowadays except during combat practice. Curze... was Curze. Dorn doubted Curze trusted anyone enough to even hold hands.

Still, to resist in these temperatures would be suicide, and Dorn was pragmatic. He slipped under the cloak and settled down next to Curze, deliberately close. Curze flinched at the contact. His body was smarter than his brain though, and Curze leaned back in to greedily take advantage of the heat Dorn radiated.

Curze's skin was icy against Dorn's, but as they sat under the cloak, it warmed. Not used to such intimacy however, Curze kept shifting, wiggling back to bask in the warmth only to jerk away again, unable to accept such weakness. It was irritating, and each movement dislodged the edge of their impromptu cocoon and allowed heat to escape and tendrils of ice to slip in.

"Oh, come here," Dorn said crabbily, and pulled Curze close. He wrapped his arms around Curze and ignored his protests, hissing, and scratching. It was like hugging a large cat. "Stay still." For good measure, he maneuvered his leg on top of Curze's and held them down.

"This is uncomfortable," Curze said unhappily into Dorn's neck. It tickled a bit.

"Well if you have a better idea, I am open to hearing it," Dorn replied. This close, he thought he could make out the curve of Curze's pale ear under his own nose.

Curze was silent and still, tense in Dorn's embrace. When he spoke again, his voice was soft and whisper quiet. "The last time someone held me, it was our father. I was... incapacitated at the time."

Dorn didn't reply, unsure of what he could say in response. He continued to hold his brother as he stared sternly out at the darkness surrounding them. Perhaps this was more of that familial feeling that humanity spoke of. That strange blossom of protectiveness that grew as he held his brother in his arms even though he knew full well that Curze was capable of tearing a world apart with his bare hands. Dorn had not felt like this in many years, not since his grandfather had died. He rested his chin on Curze's head gingerly, and pretended he was a child again, cuddling for warmth in the dark.

Curze bit him.

Dorn held on with stoic disapproval. Curze's biting became a steady, rhythmic chewing. Wincing, Dorn realized his brother had fallen asleep and was gnawing on his pectoral the way a babe would at his mother's breast. Well, this was closeness as well, he reasoned and settled for an evening of discomfort. It wasn't terrible. A hard life of hard training and his genetically-engineered body had left him with a chest as steel-strong as a ship's bulwark. Curze's teeth weren't anything against such power and it was actually somewhat pleasant once he acclimated to the sensation. Odd, but pleasant.

After some time, ensconced in warmth and unaccustomed intimacy, Dorn thought, _Yes_. _This closeness is actually very nice._ Perhaps they should try this more often.

* * *

><p>THE END.<p> 


	2. Chapter 2

BROTHERS IN AWESOME- WH40K (Horus Heresy, IDIOTS)

_Written for the Canadian Shack 10th Anniversary Party 2012._

Summary: Two Astartes serving under Curze and Dorn resolve their differences.

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><p>"You!" Sigismund roared from across the strategium of the <em>Phalanx<em>. Guardsmen and servitors looked up at the thundering approach of the Imperial Fists' First Captain and made themselves scarce. The target of his ire didn't bother looking up from where he lounged against a table, studying the hololithic starchart of the Cheraut system.

"Look at me when I address you," Sigismund said with a growl as he halted so fast, so close, that a skull resting on Sheng's shoulder paldron was knocked off by the wind. Sheng turned his head languidly and looked up at Sigismund.

"Were you addressing me? It was hard to tell, seeing as my name isn't 'you'," Sheng said. He smirked as Sigismund coloured red in fury and embarrassment. "Equerry Sheng, if we're being formal. But we don't have to be so formal, do we?"

Sigismund took a step back to collect himself. "Sheng," he tried again. "What is the meaning of this?"

"I'm afraid I'm not following, I don't have -" Sheng tapped his temple and winked. Sigismund gritted his teeth, loudly enough that Sheng felt a twinge of concern for the apothecary who would be fixing that later. Sigismund picked Sheng up under one arm and stormed out of the strategium. Sheng was in a lighter, stripped-down version of his power armour, but this was still quite a feat under the circumstances.

The decks of the _Phalanx_flashed past Sheng's eyes as Sigismund strode angrily through the ship. When he halted, there was snow on the ground. Sheng was even more impressed. Sigismund had carried him for an entire day by ship time, past crew and Astartes and an entire migration of localized animal life that had sprung up in one of the _Phalanx_'s many environments.

Sigismund threw Sheng into a snowdrift with all the respect of a discarded sock. Sheng grunted.

"You broke my hip," Sheng said accusingly.

"What?"

Too easy. Sheng swept his leg to trip Sigismund, thinking how ridiculously serious the sons of Dorn were. Then found out why, when Sigismund reacted faster than Sheng had ever seen for an Astartes. Sigismund hopped back, Sheng's sweep barely kissing him as his feet touched the ground again. He stood, surefooted and ready, watching Sheng with narrowed eyes.

"I still don't know what this is about," said Sheng, rolling up into a low crouch.

It was a fight that should've been over in seconds. For all that they were both Astartes, trained and gene-bred to be mankind's most potent weapons, there was no comparing the martial prowess of First Captain Sigismund of the Imperial Fists, acknowledged throughout the legions as one of the best fighters in service to the Emperor, to Equerry Sheng of the Night Lords, known more for his guile and the mystery surrounding how he had been selected for what was a position of honour. Trickery would be of little deterrent to a consummate warrior such as Sigismund.

There were, however, several factors that made the fight last an entire minute.

For one thing, Sigismund was, despite his temper, an honourable Astartes - especially as it reflected on his primarch. He followed the rules of engagement governing the actions of an Astartes toward their fellow legionnaires in matters of challenges and protocol. Though they were both captains in their respective legions, Sheng had a slight edge in standing by being his primarch's personal attendant.

For another, it had been a moment's impulsiveness that brought them to this improper duel. Sigismund had needed to speak to the Night Lord alone, immediately, and had little time or patience for Sheng's prevarications. Upon realising the various problems with the impromptu kidnapping, he had bulled ahead while he thought of a way to salvage the situation. Sheng himself had been strangely compliant throughout the whole thing.

It confused Sigismund, and his confusion was so unnatural to his regular state that it caused him to hesitate rather than engage. Sheng, no stranger to taking advantage of an opening, used Sigismund's distraction to scramble through the snow at haste.

Sigismund lunged after Sheng. A snowball hit him in the face. Relentless, Sigismund stepped on Sheng's trailing breechcloth, and then leaned down and grabbed one of the chains flying from Sheng's paldrons. The paldron and breechcloth tore off as Sheng planted a foot on Sigismund's greave and launched himself further away.

"Stand and fight, you dog!" Sigismund shouted.

Sheng was on his feet again and he lobbed another unerringly accurate ball of ice between Sigismund's eyes. It grazed Sigismund's cheek instead, as Sigismund tilted his head to the side disdainfully. He stepped forward again.

And tripped, as it turned out, what looked like Sheng crawling around on the ground was actually his crawling around on the ground and laying traps with fallen branches.

There was a reason Sheng had made equerry.

Sheng hadn't accounted for Sigismund landing on his legs in full battle armour, however.

"Oh, good job," Sheng said as he stared at his broken legs. "Tell me to stand and fight now, Sigismund."

Getting up, Sigismund only frowned. "That's barely a crippling injury," he said disdainfully.

Sheng stared at Sigismund. Sigismund crossed his arms and continued to frown down at him.

"A quick trip to the medicae and we can continue," Sigismund said, tapping his vox. His brows knit and somehow his frown deepened. He tapped his vox again, shook his head, tapped. "Huh. Out of range."

"How is that even possible?" asked Sheng. He activated his vox as well. A crackle of static greeted him.

"It's a big ship," Sigismund said, shrugging. "No matter, we'll just..." His voice trailed off as he looked around. Snow had started falling at some point, obscuring their tracks. The sky was a blank grey expanse instead of the more familiar arched ceilings of the rest of the ship. It appeared they were in one of the many immersive environments used for training. Hololithic projections contributed to the illusion. "Hm," Sigismund said as he stared at the mountains in the distance.

The Night Lords preferred to stay on their own ships as much as possible during their current campaign, in part because the ships of the Imperial Fists and Emperor's Children were much too bright for their Nostraman eyes. He was, therefore, not as familiar with the _Phalanx_as he would've liked, but reading the expression on Sigismund's face, he had the sinking feeling that the stories he'd overheard as he lurked in the shadows of the ship were true.

Stories of entire regiments going missing and subsequent rumours of villages appearing on the ship; of ratings turning corners and reappearing years later with tattoos and children in tow; of an entire empire of discarded servitors waging war against each other in forgotten corridors and chambers in the fringe sectors. Sheng had tried several times to secure schematics of the _Phalanx_under the pretense of needing to know the ship's layout in order to best serve his primarch's needs while they were on board, but in the end, he'd given up trying to remember or even grasp the vast and contradictory number of blueprints. Dorn's hobby, when not waging war in the name of the the Emperor was, apparently, making adjustments and additions to his legion's floating fortress. Thus, only Dorn knew every inch of the ship.

"You're lost," Sheng accused Sigismund. He used some of the broken straps and chains of his half-armour to fashion makeshift splints for his legs. His accelerated physiology was already at work healing the breaks, but it would be irritating to rebreak them if they were to heal crooked.

"I'm not lost," Sigismund said cheerfully, "_we're_ lost."

"That's so much better," Sheng said.

"Maybe if you hadn't sent your primarch after mine, this wouldn't have happened."

Sheng grimaced. He'd had his reasons, but he wasn't about to reveal them to Sigismund. Especially not now.

He wondered if anyone would notice he was missing. Sevetar, probably not. Vandred or Malcharion might, perhaps, though only if they thought of something to bother Curze with. It was rather depressing to realise that he didn't think anyone would bother sending out search parties. Still, he thought brightly, the Fists seemed the type to want someone like Sigismund around to drill them endlessly and frown at things disapprovingly. If he read the character of the legion correctly, there was already a whole company dedicating themselves to finding their missing captain right now.

In the meantime - Sheng yelped as Sigismund picked him up. "You wouldn't throw an invalid around, would you?" Sheng said. He casually grabbed onto Sigismund's sword belt just in case. At least this time he was being cradled comfortably, as opposed to slung like a sack.

"Why would I do that?" Sigismund gave Sheng a withering look. He scanned the landscape, which was beginning to lose all identifying features under the barrage of snow that had been steadily building while they bickered, and started marching.

"Tell me you know where you're going and didn't chose a random direction," said Sheng.

"Yes and no," Sigismund replied.

"I thought you were the pragmatic, uncreative, humorless, brickheaded straight-man of your legion?"

"You'll find out, won't you," said Sigismund with a maniacal grin.

Weeks later, Dorn and Curze returned from their side trip to assist in the cleansing of the space hulk, _The Canadian Shack_. Search parties had been sent out, but had become embroiled in a pitched territorial land grab between two of the lost regiments. All the participants in that minor war had put down their arms and slunk back to their proper positions after Dorn had sighed loudly and crossed his arms at them. **  
><strong>**  
><strong>Imbued with an uncanny knowledge of where everything on his ship was, Dorn, with Curze shadowing him, then located the wayward Astartes captains and ventured forth to retrieve them. They found Sigismund and Sheng in an ice shack in the northern quadrant of the _Phalanx_, in a compromising position. Dorn sighed and crossed his arms once more, though with Curze commandeering half his cloak due to the snow, it was less impressive than it typically was. Sheng failed to wipe the smug smile off his face regardless, and Sigismund's satisfied smirk was little better.

The expedition fleet continued on its path to the Cheraut system.

* * *

><p>THE END<p> 


	3. Chapter 3

Brothers In Winter- WH40K (Horus Heresy, the Mournival)

_Written for the Canadian Shack 10th Anniversary Party 2012._

Summary: (A little more seriously) In which the Mournival gets lost in a snowstorm during compliance negotiations. It happens.

* * *

><p>They had been warned. Abaddon, being Abaddon, had rushed into it regardless; Torgaddon, being Torgaddon, took that as the signal to charge ahead as well. Loken and Aximand exchanged resigned looks before they ran after them. Snow was falling faster with every passing moment, and their white cloaks only made it harder to see each other in the weak light.<p>

"Over here!" Loken heard Torgaddon shout. The thick-falling snow muffled the sound, but his genhanced ears were more than up to the task of discerning Torgaddon's location. He grabbed Aximand's hand and tugged him along, veering left. A dark, looming shape became visible between the blizzard's barrage.

"Here, Loken! Aximand!" Torgaddon appeared out of the white, his black hair covered in snow. "Come along," he said, taking Loken's hand and striding toward the shadow in the sky, which resolved into a rustic wooden structure raised high on stilt legs.

"A cabin," Loken said in surprise, and he regretted opening his mouth as a chunk of ice slammed into his face, slicing open his lip. Blood smeared down his chin, freezing into red icicles as the trio climbed up the steep stairs to the entrance.

Torgaddon pulled them in and shut the door. After the constant howling noise of the rising snowstorm outside, the insulated quiet was like going deaf. Loken shook snow out of his ears.

"A shack, more like," said Torgaddon, reaching out to brush ice from Loken's hair. He frowned and switched to wiping the blood marring Loken's face.

"Well it's something," Aximand said, stomping his boots. "It's warm, at least."

"It only feels warm after being outside in that," Abaddon said from the other side of the room. He had stripped off his cloak and tunic, leaving them in a wet pile with his boots by the door, and was searching through a rusted metal cabinet, clad only in the white breeches of their diplomatic uniforms.

The new uniforms had been introduced under the advisement of the diplomat from Terra. Their ceremonial armour had been deemed too warlike, too imposing, for what were supposed to be peace talks with planets being brought into the fold of the Imperium. They had grudgingly worn the uniforms to the summit on Canada, a tentatively welcoming ice world.

Before they disembarked, a Canadian told them of the incoming winter storm and suggested they wait for the covered sleds to bring them to the city. Abaddon had scoffed, jumped off the lander ramp, and had not gone five steps before being swallowed up in a flurry.

"We wouldn't be having this problem if we were wearing our power armour," Abaddon continued sourly.

"They did warn us," Loken said.

"This will prove our point to Lupercal about the uniforms, if we survive," Aximand said.

Torgaddon laughed, kicking off his boots. Aximand sniffed and removed his with more care, lining them up at the door and hanging his dripping cloak on one of the pegs fixed to the wall near the entrance. "We are without armour, without weapons or vox-casters, at an unknown location on a potentially hostile world in the middle of a winter storm we were informed could last anywhere from three hours to three weeks. We need to think seriously about our options, Tarik."

"We can always count on Horus to look on the bright side," Torgaddon said, removing his tunic and throwing it at Aximand's head. Aximand dodged with a smile.

Loken stripped off quickly to avoid involvement in the wet tunic wrestling match. It was an intimate privilege to see Little Horus's mercurial shifts of mood, from his usual melancholic state to a playful humour on par with Tarik's. But as it was with Tarik, it was best to stay out of the way when it happened. Loken joined Abaddon on the other side of the room.

"Ezekyle, what have you found?"

Abaddon pulled out a folded piece of cloth. "Help me with this," he said.

It was a large blanket, made of a soft woven fabric and dyed in a mute striped and checked pattern.

"That's my sleeping arrangement sorted, what about the rest of you?" Torgaddon said coming over, Aximand not far behind, and both of them flushed from their scuffle.

"It's big enough for all of us," Loken said mildly.

"Garvi," Torgaddon said with a purr. He slumped over Loken's back and grinned at Abaddon. "Dibs on the middle." Abaddon rolled his eyes. "Fight you for it," Torgaddon said. Abaddon considered, then bared his teeth. Aximand snickered.

After some hard elbows and knees in soft places, they settled down under the blanket, which soon turned warm. They talked as the world outside roared and the roof creak alarmingly. To conserve energy until the storm passed or until they were found, they slipped into half-sleep using their catalepsean nodes.

Loken was the last to close his eyes. Torgaddon had tucked his head into the curve of Loken's neck, while Aximand was curled comfortably behind Loken. From behind Aximand, Abaddon slung a long arm around them all. Contentment eased through Loken. With his brothers at his side there was no danger they could not destroy together, no challenge they could not overcome. A cold winter in barely adequate shelter would not dare to end them.

As Loken slipped into unconsciousness, certainty and trust in his battle-brothers suffused his thoughts. The future before them was bright, and they would face it together.

* * *

><p>THE END<p> 


End file.
